Sophia at daycare today

My cute little chunkey monkey working on some tummy time and watching her butterfly at daycare!

Well Check-ups

Both Madeline and Sophia had their well check-ups today, 2 years and 4 months respectively. Madeline only gained half a pound in the past 6 months and grew a little over 1 inch. She is average for both and completely healthy.

And Sophia is doing a great job of catching up to her sister! They practically have the same stats for 4 months. She is 15 pounds 14 oz. (90th percentile) and 25" long (75th percentile). Madeline was 15 pounds 15 oz. and 25.5 inches long. Sophia is a little behind developmentally though, but it's nothing to be concerned about yet. She is just a little behind the curve on smiling, cooing, head control and rolling over. I think alot of this is due to her personality though. She is very laid back and just loves to chill and observe everything. Sooo opposite from her sister. We'll start doing more tummy times to build up those baby muscles before her 6 month appointment.

Teaser's from Jenna and Andy's Wedding

I'm taking a page from Jenna's photograher and posting a few teaser pictures from this weekend. I don't have time to go through all 100 that I took right now, but here are a few that I really like.

A letter to Madeline on her 2nd birthday

Baby Doll,

Oh how you've grown in this last year! A year ago...

- you had just started walking and now you love to "run fast."

- you were saying your first words and now you tell us how it is. You will explain something in depth in your baby gibberish but we only understand a hand full of it. That doesn't mean you don't have a large vocabulary though, because you do. You can count to ten in both English and Spanish.

- you would actually eat your vegetables and most anything your Mommy put in front of you and now you basically survive off of garlic bread and fruit. At least there is something good in there.

- you were an only child and now you are a great big sister. You love to hug and kiss on Sophia. You are concerned when she cries and will sometimes go to try and soothe her yourself by patting her on the head.

- you were sleeping in the crib and now you are in your own toddler bed. When we moved you before your sister arrived, you were crazy with excitement. You had already been napping in a cot at daycare and now you had freedom at home too. When you get up a little too early in the mornings, you come snuggle with us and we love it. When you wander out of your room before we go to bed, we sometimes find you sleeping in strange places (the hall, the middle of the room, your sister's activity mat). When you sleep, you MUST have your "munkey" (a.k.a. blanket) and baby doll.

You love to read. Every month you have a new favorite that we have to read at bedtime. Madeline's Rescue, If I Ran the Zoo, The Lorax to name a few. Daddy has Oh, the Places You'll Go memorized from reading it so much. Your teachers at school comment on this as well. They say you grab a book and read by yourself in a corner all the time.

You have begun a fascination with shoes and you know which ones are your special ones. You ask us to put your dressy ones on and then you run around dancing in them. Your Daddy is hoping this is just a phase.

Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is your obsession. You are giddy when we turn it on and you love naming all the characters as they appear on screen.

" 'Side play toys." That is what you say when you want to go outside and play with your toys. You don't really have a favorite toy, you just like being outside and running around. Especially with your Daddy. He gives the best buggy rides around.
We weren't sure how to address this letter; Madeline, Baby Doll or "That's You." Even though you know your name is Madeline, you call yourself "that's you" all the time. This is because Mommy would point and say "that's you" when showing you pictures of yourself.

This past year has been amazing and we can't imagine what the next will bring. Watching you grow up is truly a joy. Happy Birthday!

Love and Hugs,

Mommy and Daddy

2 under 2

Phew! Two kids are alot of work! I'm not sure if it's because just two kids are alot of work or because two small kids are alot of work. Probably a little of both. We never knew how good we had it when we only had one.

They are never on the same page for naps. Sophia will go down for her morning nap and then literally wake up minutes after I put Madeline down for her afternoon nap. Then the reverse happens when Madeline wakes up. I suppose one good thing about that is I can get some good one-on-one time with Sophia, which I don't get a lot of now.

Sophia also has a sense for when I'm eating. It never fails when I sit down for a meal, no matter what time, she will need something. We have completely given up going out to eat until Sophia gets much older. I usually end up walking around the restaurant with her until Andy and Madeline finish eating.

I think I'm just feeling extra overwhelmed lately because Andy hurt his back a few weeks ago. It was really bad at first and all he could do was lay down with an ice pack and a heating pad. That basically left me alone to handle both kids along with everything else. That was tough! I have even been cutting the grass. And oh yeah, we have push mower. That is one heck of a workout! Lately things have gotten better, but Andy still isn't 100% yet. It will be awhile.

We also decided to pull our house off the market. It makes us sad and disappointed but it's the smart thing to do right now.

So with all this going on, I was ecstatic to find out I had some extra hours at work that I needed to take off. I ended up taking Tuesday afternoon off and went shopping. For myself. I don't think I've bought anything for myself in over a year. It was wonderful! As I was leaving the mall, I noticed a massage place. I was bummed because I didn't have time to stop. But I will remember that place and next time I'm stopping.

Peanut Butter Jelly Time

Summer is here!

The kids and I had a great time outside the other day. It was perfect weather for playing in the pool. I may or may not have gone overboard with the sunscreen.

Madeline loved dumping water in and out of things.

Sophia was keeping an eye on her sister from a nice, shady spot in the yard.

We were outside for a long time, so I grabbed Sophia's favorite play spot and put it in the shade for her. As usual, she loved it. That is, until she started getting splashed on by her sister. I guess I put it a little too close to the pool.

Then it was snack time.

"Mom, seriously. More pictures?"

"Oh, okay."

4 Months Old!

Sophia is 4 months old and is doing better than ever. She is getting bigger and bigger, as you can see. She is getting better at holding her head up too, but with such a big noggin' it's still kinda wobbly. She definitely knows her Momma and cries when strangers hold her. She loves her sister and watches her every move when she is close by.

This picture cracks me up!

Big sister Madeline showing Sophia some love.

Lots of counting

Madeline has recently learned how to count, or at least recite the correct numbers in sequential order. She loves to do it and does it ALL THE TIME. We also encourge her a bit because it's so darn cute. In this video, she counts Mommy's Mother's Day flowers and apples from her current favorite book, "The Giving Tree." Listen to how she says nine and ten in Spanish. Where she gets "beat box" from diez, we'll never know.

Sleeping in strange places

Andy and I went to bed the other night and this is what we found. Madeline had gotten up and then fallen asleep in Sophia's activity mat. Silly girl.

Mother's Day with my girls

Jenna's Graduation

Jenna graduated from the University of Cincinnati Law School last weekend. It was a great ceremony and I'm glad we were able to go see her walk across the stage.

For the hooding, she was allowed to have her fiance do the honors. It meant a lot to her and it was neat to see. Although both Andy and I were too absorbed with taking photos to actually see it happening. I had Jenna's camera and he had ours. Boy, video is so much easier. That was tough capturing "the moment" as it was happening.

Afterwards we all went out to Montgomery Inn to celebrate.

And Madeline was there to keep us all entertained, of course. Sophia didn't make it. After much screaming from all the travelling, she conked out at home so we left her to rest peacefully with Davit.

I think Madeline liked that we all had bibs on just like her.

Cake from Servatti's.......oh man, it was so good! Randy must have had one too many drinks by this point in the evening.

He decided to wear the cake toppings.

Now Jenna is off to get married and then study for the Bar. We wish you the best of luck!

Touch-A-Truck

I took the girls to a Touch-A-Truck event on one of my days home with them last week. They had all kinds of trucks there (dumptruck, boat, school bus, firetruck, snow plow, zamboni and more). I thought it was pretty neat, but Madeline wasn't too interested.

She really liked the pinwheel one of the vendors gave her though.

After walking around a bit, we ended up at the playground.

But then we saw this girl dressed up as a woodpecker. Madeline LOVED this! She wouldn't leave. We stood there for a good 5 minutes while other kids came and went.

As enamored as she was though, this was as close as she would get. To see how excited she was over this made the trip totally worth it.

Head, fingy, ears

"Head, fin-gy, ears"......that's Madeline's version of "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes." It cracks us up when she sings it! Her first version was "head, fin-gy, toes" but then changed toes to ears for some reason. She is a silly girl.

And now when something outrageous happens, she says, "Oh goodness!" Like when she sees the mess she makes in the living room. She must have picked that up from a teacher at daycare because we don't say that. Although, now I'm picking it up from her.

Sophia is ready for the beach!

Today was beach day at daycare and Sophia looks the part.

Three Months Old

Our little sweet pea is 3 months old today! The second time around, it really goes fast. I can't believe she is this old already. She is smiling and cooing now and her favorite thing is her activity mat. She will lay on that forever and kick, squirm and coo.